Article in the SF Gate - 12.31.23
“Great moments are borne from great opportunity”. There’s my painting #834 bringing up the rear on the anchor leg in the last gallery … so much solid artwork to see before you get to the end of the show but it’s a nice location and the work is at eye level …
Ken @ The deYoung
In front of the painting … with my glasses on.
Here’s a link to my very first podcast interview. Dale Dougherty of the Sebastopol Times called it ‘Ken Berman’s Industrial Whimsy’.
Additional articles about the deYoung Open 2023 exhibit:
Article in Forbes Magazine.
Article in the New York Times.
Article in the SF Chronicle.
Article in Hyperallergic.
Article in the Press Democrat. I have a quote and a few photos in this article.
Article in the Petaluma Argus Courier. I have a photo in this article.
Article in the San Francisco Bay Times.
Article in the Bold Italic.
Article in the Marin Independent Journal.
Article in the San Francisco Examiner.
Excerpt from the New York Times article that I really like: “But in the United States, no major museum other than the de Young does an open call on such a large scale, perhaps because it goes against the grain of how museum professionals these days are trained. It’s an experiment that changes the role of curators from rather controlling gatekeepers to highly democratic door openers. And that means that some of the work is horribly — or wonderfully, depending on your point of view — out of touch with curatorial and market trends.”
Listing of my artwork on the deYoung website.
I came across Ernest Hemingway’s speech for his Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. I switched out words referring to writer/writing with art/artist (italic) since there are strong similarities between what he said about writing and what it’s like to be in the world of art.
“Art, at its best, is a lonely life. Organizations for artists palliate the artist’s loneliness but I doubt if they improve his art. He grows in public stature as he sheds his loneliness and often his work deteriorates. For he does his work alone and if he is a good enough artist he must face eternity, or the lack of it, each day.
For a true artist each artwork should be a new beginning where he tries again for something that is beyond attainment. He should always try for something that has never been done or that others have tried and failed. Then sometimes, with great luck, he will succeed.
How simple the creation of art would be if it were only necessary to paint in another way what has been well painted. It is because we have had such great artists in the past that an artist is driven far out past where he can go, out to where no one can help him.”